Mysterious Toe Rings Found On Ancient Egyptian Skeletons

The male ancient Egyptian skeleton lived more than
3,300 years ago and died at the age of 35-40, before being buried
with a ring on his right toe.Photo
courtesy the Amarna Project

Archaeologists have discovered two ancient Egyptian skeletons,
dating back more than 3,300 years, which were each buried with a
toe ring made of copper alloy, the first time such rings have
been found in ancient Egypt.

The toe rings were likely worn while the individuals were still
alive, and the discovery leaves open the question of whether they
were worn for fashion or magical
reasons.

Supporting the magical interpretation, one of the rings was found
on the right toe of a male, age 35-40, whose foot had suffered a
fracture along with a broken femur above it. [See
Images of Skeletons & Toe Rings]

Unique rings in a unique ancient city

Both skeletons were found in a cemetery just south of the ancient
city of Akhetaten, whose name means "Horizon of the Aten." Now
called Amarna, the city of Akhetaten was a short-lived Egyptian
capital built by Akhenaten a
pharaoh who tried to focus Egypt's religion around the worship of
the sun disc, the "Aten." He was also likely the father of
Tutankhamun.

After Akhenaten's death, this attempt to change Egyptian religion
unraveled, as his successors denounced him and the city became
abandoned. Even so, Anna Stevens, the assistant director of
the Amarna
Project, said the newly discovered rings are unlikely to be
related to the religious changes Akhenaten introduced.

The findings do appear to be the first copper alloy toe rings
discovered in ancient Egypt. "I'm not aware of any, but that
doesn't mean they don't exist. Bear in mind that if we found
something like this in a house, for example, we would have no
idea of its purpose,"Stevens wrote in an email toLiveScience.

A gold toe ring was previously found on a mummy named
Hornedjitef, a priest at Karnak more
than 2,200 years ago. Themummy,
which resides at the British Museum, has a "thick gold ring on
the big toe of his left foot," writes anthropologist Joyce Filer
in her book "The Mystery of the Egyptian Mummy" (British Museum
Press, 2003). [Images:
The Faces of Egyptian Mummies Revealed]

A magical healing device?

The man whose right foot had been injured was likely in great
pain when alive.

He "showed signs of multiple antemortem [before his death]
fractures, including of several ribs, the left radius, right
ulna, right foot (on which the toe ring was found) and right
femur," Stevens wrote. "The fracture of the right femur healed at
an angle and must have caused this individual considerable
ongoing pain."

The ring was placed on the toe of the injured foot, suggesting
perhaps it was intended as a magical healing device of sorts.

"The act of 'binding' or 'encircling' was a powerful
magical device in ancient Egypt, and a metal ring, which can
be looped around something, lends itself well to this kind of
action," Stevens said. "This is a possibility that we will look
into further, checking through sources such as
the corpus of magico-medical spells that have survived from
ancient Egypt, to look for parallels."

However, the skeleton of the second individual with the toe ring,
found in 2012, bore no visible signs of a medical condition.
Stevens notes that this individual has yet to be studied in depth
by bio-archaeologists and its sex is unknown.

Who were they?

The skeletons were wrapped in textile and plant-stem matting, and
both burials had been disturbed by tomb
robbers.

None of the skeletons in the cemetery were technically
"mummified" so to speak. "There is no evidence from the cemetery
as a whole of attempts to mummify the bodies, in terms of the
removal of internal organs (we quite often find remains of brain
within the skulls) or the introduction of additives to preserve
tissue (the bodies survive largely as skeletons)," Stevens
wrote. "But in a way the wrapping of the bodies within
textile and matting is a step towards preserving the shape of the
body, and a form of simple mummification." [In
Photos: Mummy Evisceration Techniques]

Figuring out who these individuals were in life is tricky,
Stevens said. This cemetery appears to represent a "wide slice"
of the city's society. These people were not wealthy enough to
get buried in a rock-cut tomb but could afford, and were allowed,
the simple burials seen at this cemetery.

"They [the two individuals] probably lived, like most citizens of
Amarna, in a small house adjacent to that of a larger
villa belonging to one of the city's officials, for whom
they provided services and labor in exchange for basic
provisions, especially grain," Stevens said.

In the case of the male with multiple fractures, his life appears
to have been especially difficult and he also has signs of
degenerative joint disease. It "suggests a life [of] labor was
more likely for this individual than, say, an existence as a
scribe," Stevens said. In both cases, however, the individuals'
lives ended with each having a copper alloy ring on one of their
toes.

The case of the male individual with the toe ring was published
in the most recent edition of the Journal of Egyptian
Archaeology. More information on the Amarna Project can be found
at www.amarnaproject.com.